


natural light

by cathedralhearts



Category: Travelers (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-14
Updated: 2017-12-14
Packaged: 2019-02-14 17:18:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,205
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13012485
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cathedralhearts/pseuds/cathedralhearts
Summary: Spending hours planning missions, doing research, arguing over opportunities for hits to take place or kidnappings to occur-- it was all just so basic. Like they were back at home, in the future. Except they’re in 2016 and the world can still be saved.Humanity was still worth saving.





	natural light

**Author's Note:**

  * For [merryofsoul](https://archiveofourown.org/users/merryofsoul/gifts).



> I'm sorry, I was really grasping at straws for what to write you for the longest time. I hope you like it.

Philip wasn’t really sure what he wanted… so he kind of just winged it. 

 

That’s the problem. None of them really  _ knew  _ each other. Not in the beginning. 

 

Don’t get him wrong-- they knew  _ of  _ each other, ran a few missions together, had some basic interactions. Mac and Carly were fucking and grew feelings somewhere along the way, and look how well that ended. He’d always been staring at Trevor, on and off over the years. Hadn’t acted on it. Too scared, too uncertain. 

 

Philip didn’t want the same thing for himself, anyway. Being focused on the mission, on saving the future, those were things he could tangibly focus on. Could work towards.

 

*

 

Historians and engineers.

 

Trevor was older than Philip. 0115. 3326 was like, a million years later. (The vernacular these days is horrible, but so awesome.)

 

Heroin was _so_ awesome. 

 

(Heroin was so  _ not  _ awesome. Marcy has been helping, but not fast enough.)

 

Basically, being a homeless drug addict living in a superhero lair was both exactly and nothing like what Philip was expecting this life to be.

 

Spending hours planning missions, doing research, arguing over opportunities for hits to take place or kidnappings to occur-- it was all just so basic. Like they were back at home, in the future. Except they’re in 2016 and the world can still be saved. 

 

_ Humanity  _ was still worth saving. 

 

*

 

“Philip?”

 

Trevor’s voice sounds like it’s underwater. 

 

Philip looks up, smiles dopily. 

 

“Hey, man.”

 

Trevor’s eyes track sideways, land on the spoon and syringe.

 

“I thought Marce was helping you with this,” Trevor mutters, undoing the tube around Philip’s arm and moving the syringe and spoon onto his side table. 

 

Philip hadn’t expected anyone to be over for hours. Their mission had only been communicated yesterday; Mac and Carly were still planning tactical advances. He and Trevor weren’t needed quite yet. 

 

“She is,” Philip manages to croak out, feeling small and dirty. 

 

(Back home, back in his time, the training didn’t prepare you for ending up in a drug addict’s body. It didn’t prepare you for the raging fire that needed to be fuelled, and how horrible it was.)

 

“Oh man, c’mon, up you get,” Trevor grunts as Philip hauls him up and into the bath. He starts yanking at Philip’s boots and socks, pulls his shirt over his head. “A nice hot bath will help get that shit moving out your veins.”

 

(Trevor has no idea what will or won’t help heroin.)

 

(But let it never be said that Traveler 0115 backs away from a challenge).

 

*

 

They’ve been asked to infiltrate a politician’s inner circle to prepare them to be a Traveler-- whatever that means these days. Since he’s been detoxing, it’s been hard to quantify his mission and the longevity, the hugeness of his purposes, versus each minute and hour that ticks by without that tar running through him.

 

He’s been awake for nearly 36 hours, all the computers running at full capacity, some even overclocking, to try and get through the security systems of the compound the politician lives on. He’s exhausted and struggling, running his fingers through greasy hair and wondering if he should change his shirt. Hacking and computers aren’t really his things, but Trevor’s created them all, gave him a crash operating course, and here he is. 

 

“Trev?” a voice comes from behind him. He doesn’t even need to look. 

 

“Hey,” he sighs out, wondering what Trevor has for him today.

 

It’s a Big Mac, a Coke, and a tattered paperback.

 

“The Art of War,” Philip says, squinting at the cover in the low light. Trevor smiles at him, crooked and warm.

  
“We have to read it at school for English Lit. I finished my assignment last night. It’s quite good, a lot we can take on board.”

 

Philip looks at it again, at the worn spine and dog eared pages. At the coffee stain on page fifteen and the rips towards the end. This book has been well loved, well used. 

 

“You bought this back with you,” Philip says. 

 

Trevor flops down in a chair next to him, his teenage body all litheness and awkward angles. So different from the body Philip is used to seeing. 

 

“Yeah. The Director told me it’d be useful. I feel like Mac probably should’ve read this, not sure what an engineer needs to know about planning and winning wars.” Trevor pauses, and looks up at the scum-covered skylights. “I just do what I’m told and build things.”

 

Philip rolls his eyes. He’s the team historian and he knows better than anyone that nobody can hide behind that.

 

“Don’t be stupid. You’ve got a brain, The Director wanted you to use it,” he says. He gets a feeling, weird, somewhere deep inside his gut, and he turns the book over and opens the front page. Up the top, in neat biro, is 3326. His number.

 

“This is mine,” he says. Trevor nods. 

 

“You forgot, but I didn’t. I was having a bad day, and you leant it to me. You said Sun Tzu was a kickass general, but didn’t know his asshole from his eyehole sometimes.”

 

“Our idea of history is the 21st century and beyond. I always wanted to know more about where we came from,” Philip mumbles, thumbing the spine. 

 

“Now you’ve got time and resources,” Trevor says. 

 

“We never have enough time,” Philip responds. Trevor laughs.

 

“Tell me about it.”

 

*

 

When Trevor kisses him, he’s in the last throes of detox, sweaty and shivering, and Mac’s been shot. They’ve driven him to the hospital and dropped him off, neither staying-- Philip’s a fugitive and Trevor’s a teenager. 

 

They get back to base and Philip’s shaking from the adrenaline, the need for the drugs like a tornado of fire and ice inside him. 

 

He starts pacing, rubbing his arms, while Trevor boots everything up and slams the doors shut. Marce is staying with Mac, and Carly’s doing recon or something-- who even cares anymore. He’s out of his shit and needs a fix,  _ fast _ .

 

“Phil,” Trevor sounds far away, and Philip’s mind is racing. The mission went way off reservation, two Travelers lost on the way and the rest of the team almost crumbling; is this all they are? Is this all they’re meant to be, fumbling wildly in the dark, in the hopes of making some sort of difference?

 

“Phil!” Trevor grabs him and stops him, and Philip looks at him. Looks at the sharp angles of his face, of those eyes that have been staring-- always staring.

 

Trevor’s older than him, if he’s being honest. Philip’s always had a crush, in his own weird way. 

 

So when Trevor leans in and kisses him, dry lips meeting chapped over, unskilled ones, it makes the world freeze around them. Philip’s eyes flutter closed. 

 

“Wow,” he breathes when Trevor finally pulls back, his hands sliding down to clutch at Philip’s. 

 

“Nearly lost it today,” Trevor says, as way of explanation. As if they haven’t almost lost it a million times now.

 

“Yeah,” Philip says, not wanting to break the moment. Trevor just smiles and leans in again.

 

*

 

It’s not right, and it might not ever be.

 

But all they can do is try. 


End file.
